Homo Sapiens 1900

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All Rise...

When Judge Neal Solon says "Your Mama!" he means it.

The Charge

"The image of man betrays that which distinguishes him from all other
beings: his ability to observe himself. It is man's fate that he not only
rejoices in what he sees, but is displeased by his faults—physical and
mental."

Opening Statement

In 1944, the Nazi Empire fell at the hands of the allies. The world saw for
the first time what Hitler and the Nazis had done: Convincing the German people
that Jews and other social outcasts were not only different, but actually
polluting the German race. Hitler had taken this idea to its most extreme and
had orchestrated the genocide of people who were considered less than
ideal—less than German. Though his actions were unquestionably extreme and
horrific, Hitler's ideas about racial purity were far from original or
unique. In fact, they were widely accepted by the world's scientific
community.

Facts of the Case

Many students of the history of World War II find Nazi Germany and the
atrocities that took place therein gruesomely fascinating. We are constantly
admonished to never forget the tragedies of the Holocaust and of the Second
World War. Less studied are the mainstream ideas that contributed to Nazi
policies of institutionalized murder in the name of "race
hygiene."

Eugenics, or racial hygiene, was a well-known "science" when the
Nazis co-opted it for their political use in the years leading up to the Second
World War. The modern eugenics movement was founded in England in the late 1800s
by Francis Galton, a cousin of Charles Darwin who is better known for coining
the phrases "nature vs. nurture," and for developing the
fingerprinting techniques still used by law enforcement officers today. By the
early 1900s, eugenics was widely practiced throughout the western world. There
was even talk of creating a national eugenics register in the United States, to
maintain information about all United States citizens and their malformities.
This would help insure that any propagation of the human race worked toward
evolution rather than devolution.

The ideas of eugenics and "race hygiene" were first introduced in
Germany around the turn of the century by Alfred Ploetz, who proposed that a
panel of doctors should decide whether a newborn baby should be allowed to live,
based on its likelihood of being completely healthy and normal. Those babies not
strong enough to survive without medical attention would be left alone to die.
Those that did not meet the panel of doctors' criteria would be quickly
exterminated.

Homo Sapiens 1900 traces eugenics from its founding with these two
men through its development and ultimately its acceptance and abuse by the
National Socialist party.

The Evidence

The first things to confront viewers of Homo Sapiens 1900 are black
and white photographs of people. Who the people are is unimportant, and the film
makes no effort to inform you of their identities. What is important is that
they were photographed, and that they were not photographed for memories or for
posterity—they were photographed so that they could be studied.

Director Peter Cohen's film is full of such pictures. The subjects may be
clothed or nude, male or female, adult or child, but they are all nameless. They
are to the viewer nothing more than they were to the scientists who took the
pictures—subjects for study. Their importance quickly becomes clear as the
narrator recounts the Frankenstein story and man's fascination with
self-perfection. The film that ensues is essentially an hour and a half essay
about the history of eugenics, tracing its origins in Europe through its spread
throughout the world, to its adoption by the first political party with race
hygiene firmly at the center of their plans—the Nazis.

Though the cover of Homo Sapiens 1900 features Nazi imagery and
pictures that recall Hitler and the Holocaust, the Nazis are not the focus of
this documentary. Instead, it is the history of ideas that have, after the fact,
become inexorably linked with Hitler and his party. This distinction is not
easily seen until one gets into the film.

First Run Features has packaged the DVD to capitalize on American
fascination with the tragedies of the Holocaust. In much the same way, filmmaker
Peter Cohen artificially lends gravity to the story of eugenics through his
filmmaking techniques. Unfortunately, his efforts are transparent and lacking in
subtlety. They do little but detract from the film. For example, it seems
obvious that Cohen wants the viewer to feel uncomfortable throughout the movie.
The soundtrack is primarily composed of dissonant, Cageian bangings on a
rattling piano. This dissonance is used for emphasis, underscoring the thoughts
of the narrator, but also to abruptly end vast silences.

The silences are another thing. They are not only aural, but visual. The
viewer spends an inordinate amount of time staring at a black, imageless screen,
being occasionally jarred by the sound of the piano. Again, it seems that this
was to emphasize what Cohen was trying to say than the words themselves impart.
Instead, it manages to make this relatively short film drag on for an
eternity.

The film has an interesting, unfamiliar story to tell, but those telling it
do not make the best use of the medium. Like many recent documentaries, Homo
Sapiens 1900 relies on archival photographs, video footage and artifacts
rather than "talking heads" to tell the story. While this method has
worked for some filmmakers, Cohen fails to elevate the story beyond what you
could find in a book. All that Cohen's film does that a book could not is
superimpose the text and the images so that the viewer must process them
simultaneously. While this could arguably be true of other documentaries, rarely
has it seemed so apparent.

What's more, Homo Sapiens 1900 suffers from a sub par release on DVD.
Certainly, some lack of attention to the extras is to be expected as this is a
niche title with a relatively small market. But at least the audio and video
should be of decent quality, right? Wrong. The image quality is a mixed bag from
the start, as the film uses a variety of sources such as archival film footage
and the "oh-so-meta" still shots of still shots, but the quality is
excusable because of the nature of the sources.

Another problem is a constant rectangular digital flickering in the upper
right-hand corner of the screen. It is one of those things that you may not
notice at first, but once you do, it is impossible to ignore. Additionally,
every time the aforementioned Cageian banging occurs on a black screen,
unintentional light waves appear in the image. The wavering black further
depletes the effectiveness of this quiet time, which Cohen likely intended for
processing and contemplating the information presented.

The audio, while less distracting, has problems of its own. The narration is
presented effectively, and is always clear, but the soundtrack is uneven.
Clipping and distortion frequently occur, consistent with audio levels beyond
what the equipment used to record it can handle. It's an annoyance, at best. At
worst, it's an intermittent distraction.

Rounding out this presentation are sparse extras. The two most meager are a
set of trailers and a set of "Also of Interest…" film
recommendations for other First Run Features films. The third and final extra is
at least pertinent: A collection of archival photographs (of both scientists
involved in the study of eugenics and of people being studied) as well as
snapshots of studies and other presentations of the ideas of eugenics. At just
eighteen photographs, the collection is brief but interesting.

The Rebuttal Witnesses

Though this review does nothing but lambaste Homo Sapiens 1900 and its
presentation on DVD, the film is not without merit. Eugenics is interesting. It
is pertinent still today, as people argue whether inherent differences exist
between races, genders, or even twins. The question is whether genetics
determines who we are, or whether we are products of our surroundings.

This question informs discussions about weight loss, education, and social
welfare—and yet the position that genetics can predispose groups of people
to be better or worse at something is still taboo, perhaps because of how people
like Hitler have abused such ideas. The minute we attribute greatness and
failure to genetics, ignoring our own faults, we start down a slippery slope of
self-importance and "scientific" supremacy. This is scary.

The film tries hard to make this connection. It falters by not letting the
evidence speak for itself, instead placing the burden of proof on the soundtrack
and deliberate pacing. The information might have been more effectively conveyed
through another medium.

Closing Statement

Charles Davenport, the founder of the eugenics movement in the United States,
once said "If man could be induced to fall in love intelligently—if
human matings could be placed upon the same level as horse breeding, the most
progressive revolution in history could be achieved." If Charles Davenport
had gotten his way, you'd be in a nationwide eugenics registry. If I had my way,
this would film would be a ten-page journal article with lots of pictures. You
can't win them all.

The Verdict

Homo Sapiens 1900 is sentenced to an eternity in the Registry of
Films and DVDs That Might Have Some Merit but That Judge Solon Will Never Watch
Again. First Run Films will be held for further questioning before the court
makes any recommendations on the proper propagation of the DVD.